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Jennifer Rice
Jennifer Rice Hello, my name is Jennifer Rice and this is my story. I was born on June 6th 1981. I was in no hurry, my poor mom was due to have me on May 14th but I always liked my comfort. My mom's name is Luvia. She is a wonderful mother, that kind of mom that you have to share with your friends because she is so nice. My dad's name is Michael. He was a nice guy too. He loved his family more than anything in the world. I was the second child of 3 girls. My older sister is 2 years older than me, her name is Melanie, and my younger sister, Sarah, was born when I was 10. You are probably wondering what this story is about. Well, the easiest answer is life. Life is a gift that we can either fail to recognize and appreciate or that we can accept with open arms and joy in our hearts. I try to be the latter. Where was I? Oh yeah, I was born. And lo and behold, my dad's first son, was in fact, a girl. I had quite the sense of humour even before birth...I faked my gender, haha! I have been told that my father and mother were relieved that I was a girl, but I don't know why. Maybe they just didn't want to go shopping for boy clothes. Anyway, life was pretty good for a year, then another. All of a sudden, it wasn't so great anymore. I was refusing to eat, crying all the time, I was very sick. One day, I stopped walking and started crawling instead. My parents took me to 5 different hospitals and were told I was fine and that it was in their heads. So, they took me home. I tried to climb the stairs to the main living area but I didn't make it. Turns out, I had a heart attack at 2 and a half years old. I guess this was my first hurdle. Obviously, I made it and my parents were right. The cause of the cardiac event was malnutrition due to untreated celiac disease. Life got good again after that. We lived in a nice small house in the suburbs. We had a pool. We were comfortable in our middle class neighbourhood. My dad worked a lot and weird shifts. Sometimes he would sleep during the day and we would have to be quiet. That was not one of my talents. One weekend, when I was four, we went on a two hour car trip to visit my uncle and aunt. I liked going there because I could ride on his bread and pastry truck and help with my uncle's deliveries. This time though, on the way back home from our lovely visit, I had noticed my shoelace got undone. I bent over to tie my shoelace and as I was working on this new skill, we got into a car accident. Everyone was ok. I was ok-ish. Unfortunately, back in the day, seatbelts were not mandatory. Because of the impact and my facilitating position, I got stuck between a rock and a hard place. Well, technically, two hard places. The floor of the car and the front seat. I must have been there a while because I learned to read my first word. Nothing to impressive, just the brand name of a loaf of bread. Anyway, they had to cut the seat away in order to free me. For some reason, I have no recollection of how we got home. Must not have been very important . My dad, I should talk about him. He was a very loving father. He always did, and still does, whatever he can for his family. When it was bed time, sometimes, he would tell us: "ok, girls, it's bed time". The next thing we knew, he was on all fours chasing us into our bedrooms and then tickling us. He always said:" Good night, I love you, sleep well." It never felt like he was saying it out of habit. He always meant it. Other times, we would finish brushing our teeth, my mom would come in and say good night, then the bed would start moving. He was hiding under it. He also liked to take me to his basement workshop and teach me how to build things and the names of each tool. I was his little helper. We would build bird houses, repair broken household items and even widdle a flute. Those are great memories. Once, while he was painting in the basement, I made a butt imprint on the wall, by accident. I thought he would get mad but he made one too, then painted over it My dad is great. My mom was always closer to my older sister and that is ok. I was closer to my dad. They would do all kinds of activities together. Not that I was neglected, never. I did the workshop stuff with my dad and my mom and sister would be colouring, shopping, going for walks, so it was fair. My mom was very attentive to her children. She gave up her work to take care of me because I was sick. Eventually, she opened a home daycare so I always had friends. In the evenings, my mom would sit on the couch and ask:" who wants their back scratched?" We would take turns, sitting infront of her, getting our back scratched, then she would brush our hair "one hundred strokes so your hair will grow strong and pretty". We did this every night. I miss those times. This was the good side of my parents but it was not all rainbows and butterflies. My father worked hard for his family. He wanted to become a Police officer but circumstances made that impossible so he worked at a factory in a major city close to where we lived. Although it was nearby, traffic made it that, on a weekend, it would take him 25 minutes to get to work but on weekdays, it took about two hours there and two hours back. He worked his 40 hours a week plus overtime and he was on shifts. One week he would work days, the next week he would work evenings, then nights and then it would rotate. That made for a very tired, overworked and stressed father. Sometimes, he would come home swearing because of traffic or an accident, then shoes went flying accross the room and we knew that we had to be perfect daughters. Unfortunetly, my sister and I were in he habit of resisting bedtime, unless my father played with us on the way to bed. He was often too tired to play. My sister and I would complain in bed just to stay awake a while later. We could always tell when he was angry and we had pushed him too far. His gait changed and we knew one of us would get the smacked, if we were lucky. If we weren't, it would be the stick. Was my mother aware that this was happening? Yes she was. Did she try to stop him? No she didn't. Am I bitter about that? At first, it never crossed my mind that she should have done something to stop it but, when I grew older, I understood that there was something she could have done. When I realised this, I became bitter and my relationship with my mother suffered. So, my dad wasn't the most patient man in the world but he did love us. He liked to spend weekends with us and vacation time. Usually weekends were alright. Being girls, we had to behave like pefect ladies in public, when we missbehaved, we would get a large hand on a shoulder or the back of the neck and he would squeezze. We were expected to smile, although I had suffered some partial dislocations of the shoulders. I was more prone to trouvle than my sister because, I was a tomboy. I enjoyed hockey, cars and woodworking. I was never a fan of sitting of walking like a lady. That got me in a lot of trouble. By the time I was 7, I had dislocated my shoulders 4 times, my fingers were in a constant state of instability and I had a broken wrist. I was accident prone though. One time, I was walking by a tombstone in a cemetary, it fell on my left foot and broke it. I can still see the scar. I've also almost fallen out of a moving car 3 tkmes. Once my sister caught me by the belt while she risked interruptikng my dad's conversation so he would stop the car. Being the optimist that I am, if you were to ask me how my childhood was, I would be a little sad aboit all the hospitsl sppointments but I would say it was good because I knew my family loved me and we did have skme great fun when my father wasn't stressed or tired. I tend to be able to overlook that. I always defended my father, no matter what. I mean, it was the 80's...that's just the way it was...today, it would totally be unacceptable back then, I don't even know. It was normal for me. When I was 8 or 9, I decided I wanted to play jockey...like, on a team. My dad was mad. " Girls don't play hockey" but I begged and asked so often, my mom called the jockey league. " No exceptions." I was so sad.I played hockey st school. I was always picked first, as ghe goal tender. I was pretty awesome. I asked my gym teacher not to tell my parents. He was great. He didn't. One morning, in second grade. I woke up, feeling well amd ready for the day. I wanted to get up and get ready for school. I never ever missed school. I loved school. I could be me. When I tried to stand, I realised I was paralysed. I could nt move my legs nor feel them. I obviously stayed home. I went to bed and the next day, evetything was back to normal. That was my first early onset multiple sclerosis symptome. My first nrain lesion at age 8. I was not a healthy kid. I am not a healthy adult. My life expectancy is sjortened. If I make it to 50, the doctors will be impressed. I'm hoping to so just that and impress them. At 27, the doc told me that I should not be able to walk. At 38, it is still a mystery to them how I get up every morning unassisted. I intend to impress and impress, I will. To be continued... '- Mia Pallas ' Category:Story Category:Short Stories